


Change of Pace

by idiotbrothers



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Crossdressing, Gen, Young Sam Winchester, preseries era
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-12
Updated: 2014-05-12
Packaged: 2018-01-24 10:27:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,062
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1601576
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/idiotbrothers/pseuds/idiotbrothers
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"It’s my little sister’s," Kyle said by way of explanation, grin growing ever wider. "Should fit you, since you’re such a midget."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Change of Pace

Sam stared back at Kyle silently, starting to frown as the other boy’s statement sunk in. They’d been playing Truth or Dare, the two of them and a couple of other kids from around the block, and normally Sam would have just chosen Truth and lied through his teeth if whatever question they asked him had to do with things they had no business knowing about, but not this time. This time he’d chosen Dare, thinking to himself that Dean always picked Dare. Dean wasn’t here right now, but Sam had expected to be able to boast to him later about whatever crazy thing he’d done.

He realized that he couldn’t do that now, not if he went through with what had just come out of Kyle’s mouth. “C’mon, runt,” Kyle urged, crossing his skinny arms over his skinnier chest mockingly. “You gonna wuss out? Knew you were too chicken to do it.” 

"I’m not a wuss," Sam hissed, resisting the urge to give Kyle a good shove, because he was the smallest kid there and Dad would kill him if he came home with a black eye again. "I’ll do it. I mean, I  _would_ , but where am I supposed to get a—”

"Wait here," Kyle said, giving him a shark-like grin before turning around and taking off towards his house, mere feet away from where they were huddled on the sidewalk. Sam supposed his excuse had been a long shot. He eyed the other boys from under his bangs, trying to discreetly size them up. They smirked back at him in a way that was decidedly menacing.Two of them were about Dean’s size. Sam sighed and sat down on the pavement, deciding to suck it up and play nice for as long as it took for them to get in a laugh or two. 

When Kyle came trotting out of his house, something clutched in his hands, Sam stood back up and tried to quell a sudden spike of panic. “Put it on,” Kyle ordered, thrusting it at Sam with a gleeful look on his grubby face. Sam took it gingerly, holding it out and feeling inexplicably nauseous. The dress was frilly at the bottom, skirt flaring outward dramatically, though the rest of it was rather plain, pale blue and unadorned and sleeveless. “It’s my little sister’s,” Kyle said by way of explanation, grin growing ever wider. ”Should fit you, since you’re such a midget.”

”Shut up,” Sam grumbled, regretting every choice he’d made in the past hour or so. He wasn’t gonna wimp out, though, or he’d have to deal with their obnoxious jeers and taunts for however long he’d be living around there. Which, granted, probably wasn’t gonna be too long according to what history had taught him, but he didn’t want to spend the rest of his days at that school cowering in a corner of the library and pretending he was too aloof and bookish for friends. Sam glared at Kyle once more before pulling off his shirt and dropping it to the ground, turning the dress around in his hands a little queasily and slipping it over his head.

One of the boys snorted, and Sam felt his cheeks burn as he adjusted the thick straps of the dress and swept his hands over its smooth fabric self-consciously. “Take your pants off, too,” one of them crowed, giggling idiotically into his palm. “Fine,” Sam spat, surprised to find that it actually wasn’t so bad once he had the thing on, though he was still feeling flustered enough that he wished he could sink through the floor.

He stuck his hands under the skirt and unbuttoned his jeans, yanking them past his knees and kicking them off. The lace at the edge of the dress tickled his bare skin, and he didn’t quite know what to do with his hands, so he fisted them in the cool cloth as he gazed at his feet, hoping his hair was long enough to shield his face from view.

"You happy?" He barked at Kyle, toeing at a crack in the sidewalk with his sneaker. "Yeah," Kyle said, shit-eating smile ratcheting up a notch when Sam peeked at him once before darting his head back downward. 

"You don’t look half bad, Samantha." The other boys erupted into sniggers, and though Sam was sure even his ears were glowing red at this point, a burst of stubbornness had him raising his head and crossing his arms in front of him in an echo of Kyle’s earlier gesture.

"You know what? You’re right. I know I look good. Try to tell me I don’t." They stopped laughing, and Kyle looked confused enough that Sam felt a premature flash of triumph embolden him.

"Uh…"

"What? You got something to say?" Sam wondered briefly how his intimidating tone came across when he was standing there in nothing but a thin dress trimmed with lace and his filthy hand-me-down sneakers, but the thought was quashed from his mind when he saw that, miraculously, it seemed to have worked. "Whatever," Kyle muttered, scratching at his cheek sullenly, his high spirits dampened now that Sam’s embarrassment had seemingly disappeared.

He seemed about to turn away and find somebody else to hassle before he glowered at Sam and said, "Give it back, my mom’ll notice if it’s gone." He paused before curling his lip and adding, "Sorry, I can see much you  _love_  wearing it.” 

Sam ignored him, easily pulling the dress off with a rustle of fabric and tossing it at Kyle, who took off with his posse trailing after him the minute he caught it.

Sam was pretty sure he heard one of them say “pansy” as they marched away, but he didn’t really care, because he felt strangely accomplished, a pleasant warmth starting up in the center of his chest and extending outwards. And then he remembered that the only thing he had on was his underwear, and he hurried to put his clothes back on. 

* * *

 

Years later, Sam was dragging his feet through the mall with a couple of friends, yawning almost every couple of minutes because he’d been up too late cramming in as much studying as he could after the night’s hunt. They stopped in front of the arcade, and Sam took one look at the flashing lights of the game machines and blanched, immediately deciding that he was heading home to take a long nap the second he broke free of them. After a handful of polite excuses Sam said goodbye and left them to it, considering calling Dean to come pick him up but remembering with a sharp twinge that he had to learn to become self-reliant if he was ever gonna survive college in the near future. He could take the bus instead.

As always, the thought of college stirred up a myriad of conflicting feelings in him, thrilled anticipation mixed with fear and disbelief. He hadn’t shown either Dean or Dad the acceptance letter from Stanford, had hidden it at the bottom of his backpack right after he’d intercepted it from the mail, not even opening it until several days had gone by with it fraying his nerves and keeping him up at night. It had only gotten worse after he read it, shocked to discover that he’d been granted a full-ride scholarship. He ached to show somebody, to have them congratulate him and tell him that of course, he could pursue a higher education if that was what he wanted. Of course they’d support him, because his hopes and dreams mattered, and if he didn’t want to spend the peak of his youth decapitating drooling beasts and stitching up the two sole members of his family after too many close calls, that was up to him. But he got the distinct impression it wouldn’t quite go down like that.

Sam sighed tiredly and pushed his bangs out of his face, slouching as he imagined how painful the announcement was sure to be, how Dean might look at him. Like he always did these days, like Sam needed to shut up and listen to Dad, needed to learn his place or else risk tearing a rift between them that couldn’t be sewn up.

As Sam walked, something in a store window snagged his attention, and he froze. There was a series of gowns on display behind the glass, long and elegant and shimmering with different colors and textures. Sam swallowed, remembering a faint moment from his childhood, of a dress hanging down over his knees and him feeling really good afterward, gutsy and confident and like he had been completely in control of the situation. Ducking his head slightly, he entered the department store, hands shoved deep into his pockets as he looked around nervously. 

Instinct wanted him to grab the first pretty piece of clothing he saw and rush into the closest dressing room with it, without regard for who saw him or what they thought, but his anxiety wouldn’t let him, making his eyes slant to the left and right of him before he ran his hands over the colorful dresses on the rack. There were too many unknowns to think about—What was his size? Was it possible to grab one without being noticed? What if someone from school was there? What would Dean think if he knew?

In the end, he moved away from the ball gowns, tempting though they were, and eyed a nearby rack of women’s jeans and skirts instead. After his eyes had scanned the available choices, he grabbed something off its hanger and balled it up, making sure he wasn’t being watched before he hid it beneath the waistband of his jeans. Luckily for him, it was small enough that it fit there without creating a conspicuous bulge.

After snatching up a random pair of men’s jeans as a cover, he darted into the dressing room and locked a stall door behind him, starting to get strangely excited. Setting the jeans aside, he pulled out the skirt and examined it only briefly before taking off his pants and pulling it on. He had a bit of trouble getting it over his waist, but he was finally able to button it, turning around a couple of times and staring at the result in the mirror. The skirt’s hemline stopped about two inches above his knees, and just like that blue dress that he remembered oddly well, it was a simple garment. It was black, and it had horizontal pleats bunching up the fabric toward its bottom half.

He frowned at his reflection, sort of underwhelmed—because he mostly just looked kind of weird, the soft hair along his legs suddenly standing out, even though Dean always mockingly claimed that the only hair on Sam’s body had migrated to his unruly head. 

Disappointed, Sam tugged the skirt off and was about to try on the jeans just for the hell of it, when his eye caught on something maroon and fluttery, slung over the far wall of the stall next to his. Reminded of the fact that this was a unisex dressing room, Sam crept out carefully and made sure he was alone before entering the empty stall and snatching up the dress, dragging it into his own stall and locking the door once more. He brushed his fingers over the dress admiringly, marveling at how soft its floor-length skirt was, decorated with tiny ruffles. It was strapless, it had a cinched waist, and Sam couldn’t get it on fast enough.

Gleefully, he discovered that it fit him fairly well, though it was tight around the chest region. He sucked in a breath as he looked at himself, the cloth of the dress comfortable and silky-smooth against his legs. The deep red of the fabric was a step away from clashing with the tanned skin of his shoulders, but he liked it anyway, reveling in the way the skirt swished when he moved.

Never in a million years would he have thought that he could enjoy wearing something so showy, but he delighted in how it made him feel, like he could do whatever he wanted with nobody there to tell him different. It was a feeling he wished he could bottle and keep with him as a personal reminder. 


End file.
